Editorial: Big-soda ban is drop in bucket

Sep. 13, 2012

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg speaks to the Economic Club of Washington on Wednesday. His proposal to ban sales of sugary drinks larger than 16 ounces was approved Thursday by the Board of Health. The health-conscious mayor has said the city spends some $4 billion annually on medical care for the overweight and obese. 'It's time to face the facts: obesity is one of America's most deadly problems, and sugary beverages are a leading cause of it,' he said in a statement this month. / Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP

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A Journal News editorial

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In Michael Bloomberg’s New York City, which is a part of America, it is still possible to purchase, for personal consumption, a corned beef sandwich that is large enough to feed a family of four, with leftovers all around. Nonetheless, the city reaches a new signpost on the road to slimmer and sleeker, with Thursday’s Board of Health vote banning sales of sugary drinks in containers larger than 16 ounces. What happens next, odd as it sounds, will remain a matter of personal choice and, most certainly, considerable litigation between big soda and big government.

The cup-ban pushed by Mayor Bloomberg — no doubt “The Biggest Loser” to beverage companies and restaurants, and perhaps the commercial diet firms — is riddled with exceptions. For example, it only applies to establishments regulated by the city; thus the plus-sized “Big Gulp,” sold by state-regulated 7-Eleven, will remain beyond the reach of beverage police. Likewise, it doesn’t apply to large-sized beers, often seen as a gateway lubricant to cheese fries, chicken wings, nachos and other assorted fatty foods.

Legal challenges expected

But it remains to be seen if there will be a ban at all; the restrictions are supposed to take effect in six months, but legal challenges are expected. Beverage-industry officials, fearing any reduction in profits, if not our waistlines, said prior to the Board of Health’s 8-0 vote that they planned to do whatever was necessary to keep the measure from spreading. “We know the country is watching,” Eliot Hoff of New Yorkers for Beverage Choices told The New York Times.

His beverage-industry backed organization, however, is already on the south side of what some regard as a slippery slope, as it pertains to government intervention into our food and beverage decisions; just Wednesday, McDonald’s announced that it would start including calorie information on store menus nationwide — essentially endorsing another Bloomberg initiative once regarded as a kind of heresy, at least by those who preferred to see New Yorkers overly plump and, well, ignorant.

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“It’s the right thing to do,” said Greg Watson, McDonald’s senior vice president of menu innovation. “It’s what a leader would do.”

Actually, it is what will be required of most chain restaurants nationwide; the Food and Drug Administration is reviewing a regulation, passed as part of the federal health care reform law, that will require such establishments to share calorie information with consumers — the thinking being that they will make healthier choices. No doubt the cup ban will force similar introspection.

Nonetheless, many remain unconvinced that Bloomberg’s quest — he has also taken on smoking, artery-clogging trans fat and guns — is a worthy endeavor. “Really … nothing more important out there?????” asked Suzanne Hennessy Citrolo in a Facebook posting. But the numbers evince a significant human and public cost for what, until now, has been wholly private decision-making — as seen in increasing incidence of sugar-related ailments, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, cancers and asthma.

Indeed, New York City now spends some $4 billion a year on medical care for overweight people. Statewide, the obesity rate has increased, from 42 percent in 1997 to 60 percent in 2008. The obesity rate for adults has more than doubled over the same period, reaching 25 percent. No less worrisome: a third of the state’s children are overweight or obese.

The annual public tab for all this excess baggage: an estimated $7.6 billion in New York, $150 billion nationwide.

Many won’t appreciate the intrusion upon their beverage choices, but the evidence is plain that the government, in significant ways, is already into the pocketbooks of all taxpayers, to cover the cost of individual decision-making and eating and drinking excess.